I think that it is much more likely that the reports of flying saucers are the results of the known irrational characteristics of terrestrial intelligence than of the unknown rational efforts of extraterrestrial intelligence.-- Richard Feynman

unique

Always remember that you are unique. Just like everyone else.

Nature made him, and then broke the mold.--Ludovico Ariosto (1474-1533)_Orlando Furioso_ [1532], Canto X, Stanza 84

Nobody can be exactly like me. Even I have trouble doing it. --Tallulah Bankhead

There is repetition everywhere, and nothing is found only once in the world.--- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

We all know we are unique individuals, but we tend to see others as representatives of groups."- Deborah Tannen (1951 &endash; )

unity

Daisies of the world unite - you have nothing to lose but your chains.
Eunuchs of the world unite - you have nothing to lose.
Misspellers of the world, untie.

Unity in things Necessary, Liberty in things Unnecessary, and Charity in all. --Richard Baxter 1651

If we do not depart from God, and disinite by that departure, and fall into disunion among ourselves, I am confident, we doing our duty and waiting upon the Lord, we shall find He will be as a wall of brass round about us till we have finishe that work which he has for us to do.-- Oliver Cromwell, to his army officers, 23 March 1649

I may worship in a different building from you, I may worship in a different style, but all we hold dear is God's gift in Christ Jesus, who is our Unity. In Him we have all and lack nothing.-- Michael J Davis

When we talk about what we believe we divide. When we talk about who we believe in we unite.--E Stanley Jones

Unity is the ultimate goal of all the ways of God.- Abraham Kuyper, Uniformity:The Curse of Modern Life

unkindness

Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn.
Robert Burns. 1759-1796. To a Mouse.

usury

Calvin dealt with the absolute prohibition upon lending money at interest (usury), for example, by arguing that it was merely an accommodation to the specific needs of a primitive society. Since there was no similarity between such a society and Geneva&emdash;interest is merely rent paid on capital, after all&emdash;he allowed lenders to charge a variable rate of interest. - Alister McGrath, Calvin and the Christian Calling, First Things 94 (June/July 1999): 31-35.

vanity

The difference between the vanity of a Frenchmen and an Englisman seems to be this: the one thinks everything right that is French, the other thinks everything wrong that is not English. --William Hazlitt, 1823

Vanity is definitely my favorite sin. -- John Milton aka Satan, in Devil's Advocate 1997

vegetables

Do you know the difference between broccoli and nose-pickings?
You have to tell your children to eat broccoli.

I didn't fight my way to the top of the food chain to be a vegetarian.

Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage.

If we aren't supposed to eat animals, why are they made of meat?

Vegetarians don't live longer, they just look older.

Nothing wrong with vegetarians. Some of my best friends are vegetarians. Admittedly, they're also quadrupeds....Peter Anderton

The conclusion which he drew, or pretended to draw, as that if it was sinful to kill and eat animals, it was not less sinful to do the like by vegetables, or their seeds. None such, he said, should be eaten, except what had died a natural death, such as fruit that was lying on the ground and about to rot, or cabbage-leaves that had turned yellow in late autumn. These and other like garbage he declared to be the only food that might be eaten with a clear conscience. Even so the eater must plant the pips of any apples or pears that he may have eaten, or any plum-stones, cherrystones and the like, or he would come near to incurring the guilt of infanticide. The grain of cereals, according to him, was out of the question, for ever such grain had a living soul as much as man had, and had as good a right as man to possess that soul in peace.
Samuel Butler, Erewhon: or, Over the Range, chapter XXVII, "The view of an Erewhonian philosopher concerning the rights of vegetables."

Most vegetarians look so much like the food they eat that they can be classified as cannibals. - Finley Peter Dunne

Vegetarianism is harmless enough, though it is apt to fill a man with wind and self-righteousness. --Sir Robert Hutchinson

A cucumber should be well sliced, and dressed with pepper and vinegar, and hen thrown out, as good for nothing.
Samuel Johnson (Boswell: Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides)

Vegetables are interesting but lack a sense of purpose when unaccompanied by a good cut of meat. --Fran Lebowitz

I'm not a vegetarian, but I eat animals who are. --Groucho Marx

The West wasn't won on salad. --North Dakota Beef Council

I was a vegetarian until I started leaning toward the sunlight.-Rita Rudner

Please understand the reason why Chinese vegetables taste so good. It is simple. The Chinese do not cook them, they just threaten them! - Jeff Smith, The Frugal Gourmet Cooks with Wine, 1986

Red meat is NOT bad for you. Now blue-green meat, THAT'S bad for you! --Tommy Smothers

vice

No vices are so incurable as those which men are apt to glory in. --Joseph Addison

Vice knows she's ugly, so puts on her mask. -- Benjamin Franklin

Some faults are so closely allied to qualities that it is difficult to weed out the vice without eradicating the virtue.- Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774)

Inactivity is the beginning of all vice. - C.F.W. Walther , letter: 15 Jan 1873

victims

People often find it easier to be a result of the past than a cause of the future.

virgin birth

I do not wish to imply that God the Son could not, absolutely speaking, have become incarnate by a non-virginal conception, any more than I should wish to deny that God might, absolutely speaking, have redeemed mankind without becoming incarnate at all; it is always unwise to place limits to the power of God. What we can see is that both an incarnation and a virginal conception were thoroughly appropriate to the needs and circumstances of the case and were more "natural", in the sense of more appropriate, than the alternatives... In practice, denial of the virginal conception or inability to see its relevance almost always goes with an inadequate understanding of the Incarnation and of the Christian religion in general.
E. L. Mascall, The Secularisation of Christianity [1965]

virtue

To Almighty God, this shrine of the arts, music and literature is dedicated by the first Governors in the year of our Lord 1931, John Reith being Director General. It is their prayer that good seed sown will produce a good harvest, that everything offensive to decency and hostile to peace will be expelled, and that the nation will incline its ear to those things which are lovely pure and of good report and thus pursue the path of wisdom and virtue - inscription inside Broadcasting House, home of the BBC

Public virtue cannot exist in a nation without private, and public virtue is the only foundation of republics.-- John Adams

[N]either the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally corrupt. He therefore is the truest friend of the liberty of his country who tries most to promote its virtue, and who, so far as his power and influence extend, will not suffer a man to be chosen onto any office of power and trust who is not a wise and virtuous man. --Samuel Adams

Prosperity doth best discover vice, but adversity doth best discover virtue. --Francis Bacon

Overvalue not therefore the manner of your own worship, and overvilify not other men's of a different mode.- Richard Baxter

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable --if anything is excellent or praiseworthy --think about such things. Phil. 4:8 NIV

Glory follows virtue as if it were its shadow. --Cicero (B.C. 106-43)

When was public virtue to be found when private was not? -- William Cowper

1. TEMPERANCE. Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation.
2. SILENCE. Speak not but what may benefit others or yourself; avoid trifling conversation.
3. ORDER. Let all your things have their places; let each part of your business have its time.
4. RESOLUTION. Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.
5. FRUGALITY. Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; i.e.,waste nothing.
6. INDUSTRY. Lose no time; be always employ'd in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions.
7. SINCERITY. Use no hurtful deceit; think innocently and justly, and, if you speak, speak accordingly.
8. JUSTICE. Wrong none by doing injuries, or omitting the benefits that areyour duty.
9. MODERATION. Avoid extreams; forbear resenting injuries so much as youthink they deserve.
10. CLEANLINESS. Tolerate no uncleanliness in body, cloaths, or habitation.
11.TRANQUILLITY. Be not disturbed at trifles, or at accidents common or unavoidable.
12. CHASTITY. Rarely use venery but for health or offspring, never to dulness, weakness, or the injury of your own or another's peace or reputation.
13. HUMILITY. Imitate Jesus and Socrates.
Benjamin Franklin's Thirteen Virtues.

It may be well my posterity should be informed that to this little artifice, with the blessing of God, their ancestor ow'd the constant felicity of his life, down to his 79th year, in which this is written.
What reverses may attend the remainder is in the hand of Providence;but, if they arrive, the reflection on past happiness enjoy'd ought to helphisbearing them with more resignation.
To Temperance he ascribes his long-continued health, and what is still left to him of a good constitution;to Industry and Frugality, the early easiness of his circumstances and acquisition of his fortune, with all that knowledge that enabled him to be a useful citizen, and obtained for him some degree of reputation among the learned; to Sincerity and Justice, the confidence of his country, and the honorable employs it conferred upon him; and to the joint influence of the whole mass of the virtues, even in the imperfect state he was able to acquire them, all that evenness of temper, and that cheerfulness in conversation, which makes his company still sought for, and agreeable even to his younger acquaintance. I hope, therefore, that some of my descendants may follow the example and reap the benefit.
In this piece it was my design to have endeavored to convince young persons that no qualities were so likely to make a poor man's fortune as those of probity and integrity.
My list of virtues contain'd at first but twelve; but a Quaker friend having kindly informed me that I was generally thought proud; that my pride show'd itself frequently in conversation; that I was not content with being in the right when discussing any point, but was overbearing, and rather insolent, of which he convinc'd me by mentioning several instances; I determined endeavouring to cure myself, if I could, of this vice or folly among the rest, and I added Humility to my list.
In reality, there is, perhaps, no one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. Disguise it, struggle with it, beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, it is still alive, and will every now and then peep out and show itself; you will see it, perhaps, often in this history; for, even if I could conceive that I had compleatly overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility.- Benjamin Franklin, 1706 - 1790, [Thus far written at Passy, 1741]

Virtue has a veil, vice a mask. - Victor Hugo, 1802 - 1885

The arguments for purity of life fail of their due influence, not because they have been considered and confuted, but because they have been passed over without consideration. - Samuel Johnson (Rambler #87)

No people can be great who have ceased to be virtuous. - Samuel Johnson: An Introduction To The Political State of Great Britain

..to write and to live are very different. Many who praise virtue, do no more than praise it. - Samuel Johnson: Addison (Lives of the Poets)

Most people are awaiting Virtual Reality; I'm awaiting virtuous reality.--Eli Khamarov ,Lives of the Cognoscenti

When you can't have anything else, you can have virtue. -- Don Marquis

The strength of a man's virtue should not be measured by his special exertions, but by his habitual acts. -- Blaise Pascal

However evil men may be they dare not be openly hostile to virtue, and so when they want to attack it they pretend to find it spurious, or impute crimes to it. --La Rochefoucauld, _Maxims_, 1665

 A country cannot subsist well without liberty, nor liberty without virtue.--Jean Jacques Rousseau

Fruits are always of the same nature with the seeds and roots from which they come, and trees are known by the fruits they bear: as a man begets a man, and a beast a beast, that society of men which constitutes a government upon the foundation of justice, virtue, and the common good, will always have men to promote those ends; and that which intends the advancement of one man's desire and vanity, will abound in those that will foment them. Algernon Sidney

Personal virtue is no substitute for political hard-headedness.-- Margaret Thatcher, The Path to Power, Harper Collins,1995, p11

Few men have virtue to withstand the highest bidder. -George Washington

vision

You can observe a lot by just watching. --Yogi Berra

he most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight but has no vision.
Helen Keller (1880-1968)In "Webster's Electronic Quotebase," ed. Keith Mohler, 1994.

Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world. - Schopenhauer

visits

Visits always give pleasure - if not the arrival, the departure.---Portuguese Proverb

vivisection

I think animal testing is a terrible idea; they get all nervous and give the wrong answers.